Why do you prefer texting to calling?

Whether it's asking for news or telling you something, whether it's chatting with people when they are bored, or wishing each other blessings during festivals (including Spring Festival greetings), everyone likes to send text messages. Ask some friends around you, they seem to have the same experience. Why on earth is this? An unthinking answer may be: to save money. Ten cents for a text message and thirty cents for a phone call. I have never doubted such an answer before, and I still believe it partially today, but I don't believe it completely anymore. This explanation regards people's choice of texting instead of calling as purely economic rational behavior, but even from the perspective of economic rationality, this explanation is difficult to establish. Although a phone call, including a mobile phone, costs 30 cents per minute, while a short message costs only 10 cents, a phone call can talk a lot and convey a lot of information in one minute, and it avoids the trouble of endless keystroke input. My experience is that even if you discuss a relatively simple thing instead of chatting, sending a message costs more than making a phone call. For example, if you want to discuss the meeting with your friends, you often need these questions: "Are you going to attend the XX meeting?" "Yes, and you?" "I was there. When are you going? " "The day after tomorrow morning." "How to get there?" "By plane." "Did you buy a ticket? Which flight? " "Yes, about xxxx years. Take off at 10 in the morning. " "Shall I go with you?" "Of course." "Well, I'll buy a plane ticket later." Few people will send these questions in a short message, and it is impossible to send all the answers to these questions in a short message. It takes at least six short messages to agree to these things, and it costs sixty cents. And the phone can solve the problem in one minute, as long as 30 cents. Not to mention that it takes several times as long to send a message as to make a phone call. In other words, in this example, SMS communication is not only time-consuming and laborious, but also not cheap or even higher. The explanation of economic rationality seems to be unworkable. In fact, the invention and use of any new media is not only a technological invention, it means a new mode of communication, a new way of interpersonal interaction and a new social relationship. Therefore, there must be more complicated cultural, social and psychological reasons besides economic and technical reasons for choosing SMS communication instead of telephone communication. The following are my initial non-economic reasons. From the perspective of text composition, different from face-to-face communication or telephone communication, the basic feature of short message communication is that it takes text as the center and conveys information composed of text, and rarely uses images, expressions or sounds. When using SMS to communicate, the communication subject can not only see the facial expressions and gestures of the other person, but also hear his/her voice. It can be said that I can't see him or hear his voice. Both sides of communication can only rely on the language and characters displayed on the screen of the mobile phone (or add limited words) to transmit, obtain and interpret information, and few other non-verbal symbols can be used. On the contrary, telephone communication is conducted by voice. A person's voice often has a very personal and physical color, and there is a sense of existence that SMS communication does not have. Voice brings the communicators closer together, giving people a feeling of intimate contact, and both sides should try to figure out the implication in each other's voice. This is the abstraction and simplicity of SMS communication. From the perspective of communication context, in face-to-face verbal communication activities, because both parties are in the same time and space environment, it is difficult to hide the feelings of the subject in the communication process, and both parties often have to observe and observe the words instead of saying whatever they want. Even for telephone communication, although the space distance can be far away, the time is still synchronous, and two people must hold their mobile phones at the same time; However, in the short message communication, the two parties are not only in different spatial environments, but also in different time environments, and there is a flexible time difference between receiving information and sending information. These two basic characteristics make SMS communication have the following derivative characteristics. First of all, due to the absence, distance and abstraction of the communication object, SMS communication avoids the emotional reactions that may accompany or bring about by face-to-face communication or telephone communication, such as shyness, embarrassment, fear, embarrassment and embarrassment. These emotional factors often don't work, or at least don't play a big role in communication. Especially when talking about some sensitive topics or sending ambiguous messages, SMS communication avoids the embarrassment that may occur in face-to-face communication. Some words may not be said face to face or inconvenient, but it is much more convenient to say them through SMS. Words that are inconvenient to say face to face or on the phone, words that you are embarrassed to say, and words that you don't have the courage to say can often be said by SMS. For example, a girl likes a boy, but she doesn't know whether the other person likes herself or not. At this time, it is better to choose SMS to express her feelings. She can send some tentative short messages with implicit form but clear content, on the one hand, it won't embarrass the other party, on the other hand, it won't embarrass herself. If the other party doesn't mean this, they will generally choose not to reply and play dumb, and this "lovelorn" girl can also play dumb and won't feel embarrassed. In face-to-face communication or telephone communication, such tentative information will not only embarrass the other party, but also embarrass yourself. Secondly, SMS communication is the least limited by time and space, and there is a more flexible and elastic time difference between receiving information and sending information, which makes communication more active and controllable than face-to-face communication and telephone communication, so it is more flexible and convenient. Both face-to-face communication and telephone communication require the presence of the other party, which is difficult to do in many cases (such as meetings, movies, plays, conversations with important people, etc.). ), which means that it is not suitable for us to answer the phone many times. But SMS can be sent anytime, anywhere, whether the other party is in a meeting, watching a movie or doing something else. It can also be sent when the other party is turned off. So you can ignore each other's convenience when sending text messages, which is not available on mobile phones. In addition, the receiver of the short message can respond flexibly after receiving the short message. He can reply immediately, temporarily or not at all. In the case of face-to-face communication and telephone communication, there is no such time difference, and the receiver of the message must respond immediately. This time difference not only shows more respect for each other, but also helps to avoid embarrassment. At the same time, it also gives the subject of information exchange sufficient time to consider how to reply to the other party's short message, especially when receiving a question that is inconvenient to answer or needs to be answered carefully. This time difference advantage of SMS is more obvious. Thirdly, SMS creates a continuous communication mode with distance. This is especially obvious in the short message communication between lovers, especially those who have just established a love relationship. There are two main functions of SMS. One is to send simple messages, such as "I have arrived" and "landed safely", and the other is to convey and communicate a relatively private and inconvenient feeling, which mainly happens between lovers. Why do lovers communicate emotionally by text message instead of telephone? This is a phenomenon worthy of analysis. I think the main reason is that sending and receiving text messages can make emotional communication as long as possible. Lovers, especially new lovers, often have endless words. This kind of protracted communication is difficult to carry out by telephone. One is that the cost is too high, and the other is that the telephone is limited by time and space, so it is difficult to play for a long time (generally, few people can find a suitable environment to flirt with their lovers on the phone for hours on end), while SMS is different. Even at work or in a meeting, you can secretly send messages to your lover and live a "letter life". What is even more amazing is that the sense of distance in short messages often makes lovers have more to say and say. Although telephone communication is farther than face-to-face communication, it is closer than SMS because the voice is too familiar. Sending and receiving short messages from one person to another gives people a distant, intimate and distant experience. Fourth, face-to-face communication and telephone communication belong to voice communication. It is difficult for voice communication to avoid the sense of existence, closeness and contact brought by a person's special voice (tone, tone, etc.). ), and modern people are afraid and even hate this sense of closeness and contact (unless they are their lovers or close friends). If a person has to send messages to people he doesn't like after work, SMS is obviously a better choice than telephone, because he doesn't want to hear the other person's voice. This situation is also obvious in some courtesy SMS greetings and SMS blessings. For example, in the New Year, out of courtesy, some elders, teachers, leaders, etc. should be given a New Year greeting. Things we don't like or even hate. At this time, it can not only achieve the purpose of SMS greeting, but also avoid hearing the "annoying" voice and long-winded inquiry of the other party. You can't do that on the phone. On the phone, not only is it impossible for a person to refuse the other person's "annoying voice" and his physical feelings, but the other person may also talk to you about things other than getting information, which are exactly what you don't want to talk about. At this time, you are embarrassed: you really don't want to talk, but out of courtesy, you can't refuse easily. Text messages are different. You can pretend you don't know or didn't see it, even if the other person sends a text message saying that they want to chat with you. When you meet and ask questions in the future, you can also prevaricate with reasons such as "the phone was out of power at that time" and "it is not convenient for meetings". In addition, the only purpose of calling is rarely to convey practical information. It is rare for a person to go straight to the point after connecting the phone (such as "meeting at three o'clock tomorrow afternoon") and then hang up immediately. This will seem inhuman. He must say some polite words ("How are you recently", "How are you", "What are you doing" and so on) to get to the point. Text messages need not be so "polite" and there are not so many red tape. Fifth, it is particularly worth pointing out that in a society with imperfect democratic system, SMS is an important channel for the public to express their political opinions. This is similar to the internet. The characteristic of totalitarian or post-totalitarian society is that people's interests, political opinions, criticisms, complaints and dissatisfaction cannot be expressed through normal communication channels, which leads to a strange phenomenon in post-totalitarian society: the ubiquitous spread of mobile phone short messages combining political satire and yellow jokes. This kind of short message is sensitive, because it usually involves sex and politics, and most of the content is taboo, so it is often passed between close same-sex friends. Unless the opposite sex is very close, such messages are rarely exchanged.